About Me

I found out
my legal given name was Mary Linda, a clever amalgamation of my
mother's, when I started Kindergarten. She did not explain the
nickname when I asked her. Noting the fact, I continued to use the
name most familiar to me, Melinda. I changed this, legally, by usage
and alteration of all legal documents when I was 23 to Melinda Pillsbury-Foster.

Pillsbury and Foster are the two lines of my family who most resonated with my own beliefs.

Dad, Dr. Arthur F. Pillsbury, had just
received his PhD from Stanford in Civil Engineering. It was 1933 and
the Depression was growing ever worse when he and Mother married. Dad's first job was designing
programs for the Civilian Conservation Corp., and they spent their
honeymoon in a tent traveling from location to location. More
on their marriage

Mom and Dad honeymooned in a tent, moving around while Dad planned out and oversaw projects for the Civilian Conservation Corp in 1932. They kept the tent until it fell apart. We kids
loved the tent. We camped out in it in the backyard, practicing for
time at the cabin in Cedar Slope, which was also fun. Dad believed
children should learn how to work and think for themselves.

There were
five of us, Anne, Carol, Charles (Cappy), Melinda and Stephen. The
family genealogy is HERE.

We had our
squabbles but loved each other very much. Stephen and I are the only
siblings left, Anne, Carol, and Cappy died of causes related to the
family heart condition.

Today I'm
working on bringing to market technologies for making a sustainable
future available.

The other
part of the story is what life has taught me about psychopaths.
Don't marry them. If you do you could have a child who is also a
psychopath. My first child, Carolyn Anne Barteaux, now Morgan Gell, is a
psychopath. Realizing this was at the same time liberating and
emotionally devastating. If this happens to you, take steps to
protect yourself. Morgan
Pillsbury Gell

It was at
Morgan's suggestion I wrote the most ignored novel in human history,
GREED – The NeoConning of
America. She
wanted to be the heroine and so I rewrote reality some to make this
possible – but the stories outside the romantic through line are
all true.

The
book is being reissued, with explanation, and will be available on
Amazon this month.